Hannibal Directive
Encyclopedia
The Hannibal Directive or “Hannibal Procedure” is a secret directive of the Israel Defense Forces
with the purpose of preventing Israeli soldiers being captured by enemy forces in the course of combat. Israel has with few exceptions adhered to the principle of not negotiating with what it considers terrorists and this especially in hostage situations. This policy led to some notable successes, such as Operation Entebbe
but also to painful loss of human life, as in the Maalot Massacre. In cases where Israeli soldiers were captured and no military solution was found, Israel was forced to negotiate with terrorists about an exchange of prisoners. On several occasions this led to a highly controversial release of hundreds or even thousands of sentenced or suspected terrorists in Israeli captivity.
The order, drawn up in 1986 by a group of top Israeli officers, states that at the time of a kidnapping the main mission becomes forcing the release of the abducted soldiers from their kidnappers, even if that means injury to Israeli soldiers.
Among other measures, the order allows commanders to take whatever action is necessary, including endangering the life of an abducted soldier, to foil the abduction, however it does not allow for a soldier to be killed in order to prevent his abduction, according to the IDF chief of staff, Benny Gantz.
, the command's operations officer, Colonel Gabi Ashkenazi
, and it's intelligence officer, Colonel Yaakov Amidror.
In a rare interview by one of the authors of the directive, Yossi Peled (later a cabinet minister) denied that it implied a blanket order to kill Israeli soldiers rather than let them be captured by enemy forces. The order only allowed the army to risk the life of a captured soldier, not to take it. "I wouldn't drop a one-ton bomb on the vehicle, but I would hit it with a tank shell”, Peled was quoted saying. He added that he personally "would rather be shot than fall into Hezbollah captivity."
The purpose of the Hannibal directive is to prevent the abduction of Israeli soldiers by enemy forces even if thereby risking their life. Israeli soldiers are ordered to stop an abduction by force and to use any means available to this end. The controversial logic behind the order seems to be that a dead soldier is preferable to a captive. The Israeli daily Haaretz
published the following formulation in 2003:
The order is considered top secret and its existence has often been denied by Israeli military authorities. The exact wording of the directive is not known and it has apparently been updated several times over the years.
For years the directive’s existence has seldom been mentioned in Israeli media and military censors generally did not allow it becoming public knowledge. Sometimes the directive has been referred to in passing or described in purely general terms. Journalist Anshel Pfeffer, for example, described the order in The Jerusalem Post
in 2006 as the “rumored standard procedure” in the eventuality of a kidnap attempt, where “soldiers are told, though never officially” the content of this order.
The Hannibal directive was described in some detail in an article published in 2003 by Haaretz
journalist Sara Leibovich-Dar, where she interviewed several high-ranking officers including the authors of the order.
Amos Harel of Haaretz
wrote in November 2011 that the Hannibal directive was suspended for a time “due to opposition from the public and reservist soldiers” and only revised and reinstated after the abduction of Gilad Shalit
in June 2006. The order now states that IDF commanders may take whatever action is necessary, even at the risk of endangering the life of an abducted soldier, to foil the abduction, but it does not allow them to kill an abducted Israeli soldier. Harel writes however that a kind of "Oral Law
" has developed inside IDF which is supported by many commanders, even at brigade and division level, that goes further than the official order, including the use of tank shells or air strikes. "A dangerous, unofficial interpretation of the protocol has been created," a senior officer told Haaretz. "Intentionally targeting a vehicle in order to kill the abductee is a completely illegal command. The army's senior command must make this clear to officers."
Before the Gaza War in 2009, Lt. Col. Shuki Ribak, the commander of the Golani Brigade's 51st battalion instructed his soldiers to avoid kidnapping at any cost and even made clear that he expected his soldiers to commit suicide rather than being abducted. "[A] soldier should detonate his hand grenade and blow himself up [together] with the person trying to abduct him."
Dr. Avner Shiftan, an army physician with the rank of major, came across the Hannibal directive while on reserve duty in South Lebanon in 1999. In army briefings he “became aware of a procedure ordering soldiers to kill any IDF soldier if he should be taken captive by Hezbollah. This procedure struck me as being illegal and not consistent with the moral code of the IDF. I understood that it was not a local procedure but originated in the General Staff, and had the feeling that a direct approach to the army authorities would be of no avail, but would end in a cover-up."
He contacted Asa Kasher
, the Israeli philosopher noted for his authorship of Israel Defense Forces' Code of Conduct, who "found it difficult to believe that such an order exists," since this "is wrong ethically, legally and morally". He doubted that "there is anyone in the army" believing that `better a dead soldier than an abducted soldier'.
On this point however Asa Kasher was apparently wrong. In 1999 the IDF Chief of Staff Shaul Mofaz
said in an interview with Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth
: "In certain senses, with all the pain that saying this entails, an abducted soldier, in contrast to a soldier who has been killed, is a national problem." Asked whether he was referring to cases like Ron Arad
(an Air Force navigator captured in 1986) and Nachshon Wachsman (an abducted soldier killed in 1994 in a failed rescue attempt), he replied "definitely, and not only."
The legality of the order has never formally been examined by the IDF's legal department. According to Prof. Emanuel Gross, from the Faculty of Law at the University of Haifa, the legal experts should have been involved. "Orders like that have to go through the filter of the Military Advocate General's Office, and if they were not involved that is very grave," he says. "The reason is that an order that knowingly permits the death of soldiers to be brought about, even if the intentions were different, carries a black flag and is a flagrantly illegal order that undermines the most central values of our social norms.
in the Israel-occupied Shebaa Farms
area. An Israeli border patrol was attacked by a Hezbollah squad with rockets and automatic fire. Three captive Israeli soldiers were brought over the cease-fire line into Lebanon by their captors. When the abduction was discovered the Northern Command ordered a "Hannibal situation". Israeli attack helicopters fired at 26 different suspicious vehicles moving in the area. The number of casualties from these attacks, civilian or Hezbollah, is not known. Neither is it known whether the captives were actually inside any of these vehicles, as was assumed. If they were the chances are that they were killed by Israeli fire. In any case their bodies were returned in an exchange with Hizbollah in November 2003.
In July 2006 two other Israeli soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser
and Eldad Regev
, were captured by Hezbollah in a cross border raid. A Merkava
II battle tank was ordered under the Hannibal directive, to pursue the Hezbollah squad and its captives. The tank however ran over an explosive charge and was totally destroyed, killing its four crewmen.
The Hannibal directive was also invoked during the abduction of Gilad Shalit
. The commission of inquiry on the kidnapping headed by Giora Eiland
concluded that the abduction could not be prevented because it took more than an hour from the time Shalit’s tank was hit until Hannibal directive was declared. By that time Shalit was already well inside the Gaza strip.
During the war there was a case where the Hannibal directive was invoked. An Israeli soldier was shot and injured by a Hamas fighter during a search of a house in one of the neighborhoods of Gaza. The wounded soldiers’ comrades evacuated the house due to fears that it was booby-trapped. According to testimony by soldiers who took part in the incident the house was then shelled to prevent the wounded soldier from being captured by Hamas. According to the IDF spokesman the soldier was killed by terrorist gun fire.
Israel Defense Forces
The Israel Defense Forces , commonly known in Israel by the Hebrew acronym Tzahal , are the military forces of the State of Israel. They consist of the ground forces, air force and navy. It is the sole military wing of the Israeli security forces, and has no civilian jurisdiction within Israel...
with the purpose of preventing Israeli soldiers being captured by enemy forces in the course of combat. Israel has with few exceptions adhered to the principle of not negotiating with what it considers terrorists and this especially in hostage situations. This policy led to some notable successes, such as Operation Entebbe
Operation Entebbe
Operation Entebbe was a counter-terrorist hostage-rescue mission carried out by the Special Forces of the Israel Defense Forces at Entebbe Airport in Uganda on 4 July 1976. A week earlier, on 27 June, an Air France plane with 248 passengers was hijacked by Palestinian and German terrorists and...
but also to painful loss of human life, as in the Maalot Massacre. In cases where Israeli soldiers were captured and no military solution was found, Israel was forced to negotiate with terrorists about an exchange of prisoners. On several occasions this led to a highly controversial release of hundreds or even thousands of sentenced or suspected terrorists in Israeli captivity.
The order, drawn up in 1986 by a group of top Israeli officers, states that at the time of a kidnapping the main mission becomes forcing the release of the abducted soldiers from their kidnappers, even if that means injury to Israeli soldiers.
Among other measures, the order allows commanders to take whatever action is necessary, including endangering the life of an abducted soldier, to foil the abduction, however it does not allow for a soldier to be killed in order to prevent his abduction, according to the IDF chief of staff, Benny Gantz.
The directive
The background to the formulation of the directive was the capture of two Israeli soldiers during a Hezbollah ambush in south Lebanon in June 1986. Both soldiers presumably died during the attack and their bodies were returned to Israel in an exchange with Hezbollah in 1996. The authors of the order were the three top officers of the IDF Northern Command, Major General Yossi PeledYossi Peled
Yossi Peled is an Israeli general and politician, the former Aluf of the Northern Command in the Israel Defense Forces. He currently serves as a member of the Knesset for Likud.-Early life:...
, the command's operations officer, Colonel Gabi Ashkenazi
Gabi Ashkenazi
Gavriel "Gabi" Ashkenazi , was the Chief of General Staff of the Israel Defence Forces from 2007 to 2011.- Background and early life :...
, and it's intelligence officer, Colonel Yaakov Amidror.
In a rare interview by one of the authors of the directive, Yossi Peled (later a cabinet minister) denied that it implied a blanket order to kill Israeli soldiers rather than let them be captured by enemy forces. The order only allowed the army to risk the life of a captured soldier, not to take it. "I wouldn't drop a one-ton bomb on the vehicle, but I would hit it with a tank shell”, Peled was quoted saying. He added that he personally "would rather be shot than fall into Hezbollah captivity."
The purpose of the Hannibal directive is to prevent the abduction of Israeli soldiers by enemy forces even if thereby risking their life. Israeli soldiers are ordered to stop an abduction by force and to use any means available to this end. The controversial logic behind the order seems to be that a dead soldier is preferable to a captive. The Israeli daily Haaretz
Haaretz
Haaretz is Israel's oldest daily newspaper. It was founded in 1918 and is now published in both Hebrew and English in Berliner format. The English edition is published and sold together with the International Herald Tribune. Both Hebrew and English editions can be read on the Internet...
published the following formulation in 2003:
"During an abduction, the major mission is to rescue our soldiers from the abductors even at the price of harming or wounding our soldiers. Light-arms fire is to be used in order to bring the abductors to the ground or to stop them. If the vehicle or the abductors do not stop, single-shot (sniper) fire should be aimed at them, deliberately, in order to hit the abductors, even if this means hitting our soldiers. In any event, everything will be done to stop the vehicle and not allow it to escape."
The order is considered top secret and its existence has often been denied by Israeli military authorities. The exact wording of the directive is not known and it has apparently been updated several times over the years.
For years the directive’s existence has seldom been mentioned in Israeli media and military censors generally did not allow it becoming public knowledge. Sometimes the directive has been referred to in passing or described in purely general terms. Journalist Anshel Pfeffer, for example, described the order in The Jerusalem Post
The Jerusalem Post
The Jerusalem Post is an Israeli daily English-language broadsheet newspaper, founded on December 1, 1932 by Gershon Agron as The Palestine Post. The daily readership numbers do not approach those of the major Hebrew newspapers....
in 2006 as the “rumored standard procedure” in the eventuality of a kidnap attempt, where “soldiers are told, though never officially” the content of this order.
The Hannibal directive was described in some detail in an article published in 2003 by Haaretz
Haaretz
Haaretz is Israel's oldest daily newspaper. It was founded in 1918 and is now published in both Hebrew and English in Berliner format. The English edition is published and sold together with the International Herald Tribune. Both Hebrew and English editions can be read on the Internet...
journalist Sara Leibovich-Dar, where she interviewed several high-ranking officers including the authors of the order.
Amos Harel of Haaretz
Haaretz
Haaretz is Israel's oldest daily newspaper. It was founded in 1918 and is now published in both Hebrew and English in Berliner format. The English edition is published and sold together with the International Herald Tribune. Both Hebrew and English editions can be read on the Internet...
wrote in November 2011 that the Hannibal directive was suspended for a time “due to opposition from the public and reservist soldiers” and only revised and reinstated after the abduction of Gilad Shalit
Gilad Shalit
Gilad Shalit is an Israeli – French citizen and Israel Defense Forces soldier. On 25 June 2006, he was captured inside Israel by Hamas militants in a cross-border raid via underground tunnels near the border with Gaza. The Hamas militants held him for over five years, until he was released on...
in June 2006. The order now states that IDF commanders may take whatever action is necessary, even at the risk of endangering the life of an abducted soldier, to foil the abduction, but it does not allow them to kill an abducted Israeli soldier. Harel writes however that a kind of "Oral Law
Oral Torah
The Oral Torah comprises the legal and interpretative traditions that, according to tradition, were transmitted orally from Mount Sinai, and were not written in the Torah...
" has developed inside IDF which is supported by many commanders, even at brigade and division level, that goes further than the official order, including the use of tank shells or air strikes. "A dangerous, unofficial interpretation of the protocol has been created," a senior officer told Haaretz. "Intentionally targeting a vehicle in order to kill the abductee is a completely illegal command. The army's senior command must make this clear to officers."
Before the Gaza War in 2009, Lt. Col. Shuki Ribak, the commander of the Golani Brigade's 51st battalion instructed his soldiers to avoid kidnapping at any cost and even made clear that he expected his soldiers to commit suicide rather than being abducted. "[A] soldier should detonate his hand grenade and blow himself up [together] with the person trying to abduct him."
Controversy within the army
The order has been highly controversial inside IDF. The Haaretz article mentions several instances where IDF soldiers or officers have refused or told to refuse to comply with the directive on legal or moral grounds.Dr. Avner Shiftan, an army physician with the rank of major, came across the Hannibal directive while on reserve duty in South Lebanon in 1999. In army briefings he “became aware of a procedure ordering soldiers to kill any IDF soldier if he should be taken captive by Hezbollah. This procedure struck me as being illegal and not consistent with the moral code of the IDF. I understood that it was not a local procedure but originated in the General Staff, and had the feeling that a direct approach to the army authorities would be of no avail, but would end in a cover-up."
He contacted Asa Kasher
Asa Kasher
Asa Kasher is an Israeli philosopher and linguist working at Tel Aviv University, Israel.-Biography:He is noted for authorship of Israel Defense Forces's Code of Conduct...
, the Israeli philosopher noted for his authorship of Israel Defense Forces' Code of Conduct, who "found it difficult to believe that such an order exists," since this "is wrong ethically, legally and morally". He doubted that "there is anyone in the army" believing that `better a dead soldier than an abducted soldier'.
On this point however Asa Kasher was apparently wrong. In 1999 the IDF Chief of Staff Shaul Mofaz
Shaul Mofaz
Lt. General Shaul Mofaz is an Israeli politician who serves as the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs And Defense Committee at the Knesset...
said in an interview with Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth
Yedioth Ahronoth
Yedioth Ahronoth is a daily newspaper published in Tel Aviv, Israel. Since the 1970s, it has been the most widely circulated paper in Israel. In a TGI survey comparing the last half of 2009 with the same period in 2008, Yedioth Ahronoth retained the title of most widely read newspaper in Israel...
: "In certain senses, with all the pain that saying this entails, an abducted soldier, in contrast to a soldier who has been killed, is a national problem." Asked whether he was referring to cases like Ron Arad
Ron Arad
Ron Arad may refer to:* Ron Arad , Israeli Air Force weapon systems officer; classified as missing in action since 1986* Ron Arad , Israeli industrial designer, artist and architect...
(an Air Force navigator captured in 1986) and Nachshon Wachsman (an abducted soldier killed in 1994 in a failed rescue attempt), he replied "definitely, and not only."
The legality of the order has never formally been examined by the IDF's legal department. According to Prof. Emanuel Gross, from the Faculty of Law at the University of Haifa, the legal experts should have been involved. "Orders like that have to go through the filter of the Military Advocate General's Office, and if they were not involved that is very grave," he says. "The reason is that an order that knowingly permits the death of soldiers to be brought about, even if the intentions were different, carries a black flag and is a flagrantly illegal order that undermines the most central values of our social norms.
Incidents where the directive was invoked
The Hannibal Directive was invoked in October 2000 after the Hezbollah capture of three Israeli soldiers2000 Hezbollah cross-border raid
In the 2000 Hezbollah cross-border raid Hezbollah militants captured three IDF soldiers; Benny Avraham, Adi Avitan and Omar Sawaid, while they were patrolling the security fence along the border with Lebanon, and took them across the border. It is not clear when or under which circumstances the...
in the Israel-occupied Shebaa Farms
Shebaa farms
The Shebaa Farms are a small uninhabited territory claimed by Lebanon, but occupied by Israel which claims they are in Syria's Golan Heights. Syrian policy is to vaguely accept the Lebanese claim, while refusing any binding demarcation until Israeli forces withdraw from the area.The United Nations...
area. An Israeli border patrol was attacked by a Hezbollah squad with rockets and automatic fire. Three captive Israeli soldiers were brought over the cease-fire line into Lebanon by their captors. When the abduction was discovered the Northern Command ordered a "Hannibal situation". Israeli attack helicopters fired at 26 different suspicious vehicles moving in the area. The number of casualties from these attacks, civilian or Hezbollah, is not known. Neither is it known whether the captives were actually inside any of these vehicles, as was assumed. If they were the chances are that they were killed by Israeli fire. In any case their bodies were returned in an exchange with Hizbollah in November 2003.
In July 2006 two other Israeli soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser
Ehud Goldwasser
Ehud Goldwasser was an Israeli soldier who was abducted in Israel by Hezbollah along with Eldad Regev on 12 July 2006, sparking the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict. His rank was First Sergeant....
and Eldad Regev
Eldad Regev
Eldad Regev was an Israeli soldier, born in Qiryat Motzkin, abducted by Hezbollah members along with Ehud Goldwasser on July 12, 2006, in Israel near the Lebanese border, sparking the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict. His rank was Sergeant First Class....
, were captured by Hezbollah in a cross border raid. A Merkava
Merkava
The Merkava is a main battle tank used by the Israel Defense Forces. The tank began development in 1974 and was first introduced in 1978. Four main versions of the tank have been deployed. It was first used extensively in the 1982 Lebanon War...
II battle tank was ordered under the Hannibal directive, to pursue the Hezbollah squad and its captives. The tank however ran over an explosive charge and was totally destroyed, killing its four crewmen.
The Hannibal directive was also invoked during the abduction of Gilad Shalit
Gilad Shalit
Gilad Shalit is an Israeli – French citizen and Israel Defense Forces soldier. On 25 June 2006, he was captured inside Israel by Hamas militants in a cross-border raid via underground tunnels near the border with Gaza. The Hamas militants held him for over five years, until he was released on...
. The commission of inquiry on the kidnapping headed by Giora Eiland
Giora Eiland
Giora Eiland is Major General Israel Defense Forces. Eiland is former Israel's National Security Advisor. He is a senior research associate at the Institute for National Security Studies and holds an M.B.A. and B.A...
concluded that the abduction could not be prevented because it took more than an hour from the time Shalit’s tank was hit until Hannibal directive was declared. By that time Shalit was already well inside the Gaza strip.
During the war there was a case where the Hannibal directive was invoked. An Israeli soldier was shot and injured by a Hamas fighter during a search of a house in one of the neighborhoods of Gaza. The wounded soldiers’ comrades evacuated the house due to fears that it was booby-trapped. According to testimony by soldiers who took part in the incident the house was then shelled to prevent the wounded soldier from being captured by Hamas. According to the IDF spokesman the soldier was killed by terrorist gun fire.
Reactions
See also
- Israel Defense Forces Code of Conduct